Montgomery Woman Recieves Prison Sentence for Theft

By Markeshia Ricks

A Montgomery woman, who was convicted for the theft of $97,036 while employed as an accounts payable clerk at South Haven Nursing Home in Montgomery, has been sentenced to serve three years in state prison.

Anne Marie Jones, 36, pleaded guilty on April 30 to two counts of first-degree theft and one count of second-degree criminal possession of a forged instrument, before Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge William Shashy.

Jones was sentenced Thursday by Jefferson County Circuit Judge Clyde Jones, who was specially appointed to handle the sentencing by the Alabama Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court appointed Jones after all Montgomery County Circuit Judges recused themselves from the case because the defendant had previously been employed by Montgomery County Circuit Judge Charles Price.

Jones sentenced Anne Marie Jones to 10 years imprisonment, with three years to serve on a split sentence with five years of supervised probation upon her release from prison. Judge Jones also ordered restitution in the amount of the money stolen.

The matter was brought to the attention of Attorney General Troy King’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit by South Haven Nursing Home’s management after they discovered discrepancies in the facility’s patient trust fund.

A subsequent investigation conducted by the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and the Montgomery Police Department determined that from September 2005 to April 2007, Anne Marie Jones wrote checks on the nursing home’s patient trust fund and represented that the money was being used for residents’ personal needs.

Anne Marie Jones was actually cashing the checks and depositing the proceeds into her personal bank account, according to King's office. She also intercepted numerous checks mailed to the facility for the benefit of residents and deposited those checks into her personal account. Upon discovering the theft, the nursing home reimbursed the patients’ accounts for the amounts stolen.

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